Disclosed Emails Illustrate Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends
Multiple messages between adjudicated offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US treasury head Larry Summers were released this week, revealing the pair acted as close contacts.
These exchanges, dating from 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging personal – and at times questionable – opinions on politics and relationships.
I am attempting to figure why [the] American elite believe if u murder your baby by beating and neglect it must be not a factor to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite feel if u murder your baby by violence and abandonment it must be not a factor to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 message. Yet hit on a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS OBSERVATION.”
At that time, Harvard University was grappling with an acceptance debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who lost his position amid a scandal after making sexist comments about women in academia, added in the email to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was possessed by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of society.”
Summers was previously a leading light in the Democratic Party circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the primary engineers of Barack Obama’s approach to the financial crisis, and a steadfast figure in the progressive media. But questions have remained about his association with Epstein, a former associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a broad exploitation operation before his passing in custody in 2019 in New York City.
Following disclosure of a prior batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a spokesperson for Summers said that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.
Left-leaning lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein believed Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, Conservative lawmakers published a larger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
The released materials show that Summers kept up friendly contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s arrest.
Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “role and association” with Summers, among other well-known liberal leaders and industry figures.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – particularly Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the aspects of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an anonymous woman, and being rebuffed.
“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” Epstein replied in an exchange on 16 March. “ignore the daddy im going to go out with the motorcycle guy, you reacted well.. annoyed shows caring., no whining showed strentgh.”
Summers reiterated his remorse in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” he commented. “I’ve expressed this previously: my relationship with Jeffrey Epstein was a grave mistake.”
Summers was president of Harvard University from 2001 to 2006. Epstein donated more than $9m to Harvard and its related programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later determined Epstein “did not have the educational background visiting fellows normally possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.
Harvard only ceased accepting Epstein’s donations after he pleaded guilty to child sex offenses in 2008.
At that point Obama’s star was rising. Summers would eventually win appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers exited the White House, he began asking Epstein for non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After media coverage about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.
